Three simple maps

woneil

Posted 12 January 2012 - 01:13 AM

woneil

Will O'Neil

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These are three simple maps intended to illustrate a case study on the failure of German planning at the opeing of World War I (in a book on organiazational failure). I wsnt them to present well on e-readers, which are constrained by small monochrome screens, limited resolution, and poor contrast ratio. Comments on any or all welcomed.

Hans van der Maarel

Posted 12 January 2012 - 03:17 AM

Hans van der Maarel

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Netherlands

These are three simple maps intended to illustrate a case study on the failure of German planning at the opeing of World War I (in a book on organiazational failure). I wsnt them to present well on e-readers, which are constrained by small monochrome screens, limited resolution, and poor contrast ratio. Comments on any or all welcomed.

Couple of nitpicks:

You show modern Dutch coastlines, this is especially noticable in the first map, where the Afsluitdijk (not constructed until 1932) and the Wieringermeer polder (1930). The other two show a dam in Zeeland that wasn't constructed until the late 1950s. This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine and I understand that The Netherlands, being neutral at that time, are not the primary subject of your map.

What you call Constance on maps 2 and 3 is actually Koblenz (where the Mosel joins the Rhine). What you call Koblenz on map 3 doesn't seem to be any city of significance.

woneil

Posted 12 January 2012 - 02:20 PM

Thanks very much! I took some trouble about borders but neglected the issue of shorelines -- even though I have some general awareness of the reclamation projects.

Next question: Does anyone have any sources to recommend for 1914-era vector coastlines, or for maps at suitable scale that I could digitize?

These are three simple maps intended to illustrate a case study on the failure of German planning at the opeing of World War I (in a book on organiazational failure). I wsnt them to present well on e-readers, which are constrained by small monochrome screens, limited resolution, and poor contrast ratio. Comments on any or all welcomed.

Couple of nitpicks:

You show modern Dutch coastlines, this is especially noticable in the first map, where the Afsluitdijk (not constructed until 1932) and the Wieringermeer polder (1930). The other two show a dam in Zeeland that wasn't constructed until the late 1950s. This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine and I understand that The Netherlands, being neutral at that time, are not the primary subject of your map.

What you call Constance on maps 2 and 3 is actually Koblenz (where the Mosel joins the Rhine). What you call Koblenz on map 3 doesn't seem to be any city of significance.

Posted 12 January 2012 - 03:43 PM

Definitely agree with everyone one the clear style and bold labeling, very nice.

I 'm not as big a fan of the patterns though. My biggest issue is on the larger map where the patterned ocean and "Invaded" pattern seem to clash. It makes the Invaded areas look hollow, like water. Any chance you could use a general gray fill for the water instead of the pattern? Or a light gray fill on the land under the regular patterns?

Waterbodies need to be a shade of gray. It is too difficult to tell the difference between the land. It would establish figure/ground.

I'm not a fan of patterns, I get dizzy looking at maps with multiple patterns. Usually I don't even bother to look. There are times when it is absolutely required but this map only has 4 elements to map (5 if you consider the water). If you don't feel that you can differentiate five shades of gray, then just change the density of your dot pattern for the invaded countries.

kru

"Ah, to see the world with the eyes of the gods is geography--to know cities and tribes, mountains and rivers, earth and sea, this is our gift."Strabo 22AD

Hans van der Maarel

Posted 13 January 2012 - 08:59 AM

Thanks very much! I took some trouble about borders but neglected the issue of shorelines -- even though I have some general awareness of the reclamation projects.

Next question: Does anyone have any sources to recommend for 1914-era vector coastlines, or for maps at suitable scale that I could digitize?

For the past century we have had the habit of changing our coastline at least once per decade. Keeps cartographers busy In fact, this project recently finished: De Zandmotor, it's a new peninsula of sand that's expected to naturally feed the dunes along the coast for the next few decades.

Here's a photo of a 1921 map that had lying around. This should give you a good idea of what the northern part of The Netherlands looked like around that time, this is just before all the major reclamation work starts.IMG_2517.jpg1.35MB47 downloads

I've been meaning to do a reference map showing the major Dutch coastline changes of the past century. One of these days...

woneil

Posted 13 January 2012 - 12:04 PM

woneil

Will O'Neil

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Location:Falls Church, Virginia

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Here's a photo of a 1921 map that had lying around. This should give you a good idea of what the northern part of The Netherlands looked like around that time, this is just before all the major reclamation work starts.

Thanks again.

I found an image of a map from a German military atlas of 1905 at http://commons.wikim...rlande_1905.png. At least at first glance it looks much like your 1921 map, which encourages me to think that I don't need to track down a map specifically from 1914 to get it right.

mapfax

Posted 13 January 2012 - 11:48 PM

Here are revised versions. Bear in mind that they will be printed at very small size -- about 4.5" (11.5 cm) width

Again, thanks for the inupts.

The map of Europe is a bit confusing to me because France is not one of the Invaded countries, but then there are maps showing the German invasion routes into France. I would suggest deleting the Invaded category and group the countries into Central Powers, Allied Powers, and Neutral. You could follow the BBC map example at http://www.bbc.co.uk...dex_embed.shtml and get detailed city location information from National Geographic maps of that time at http://maps.national...e-map-1915.html. Other countries joined the Allies and Central Powers during the war, so you might want to put a date in the map legend. For example, I believe Italy joined the Allies in 1915.

Also, I am pretty sure that Great Britain never included Ireland. Great Britain is usually defined as the island made up of England, Scotland, and Wales (see http://en.wikipedia..../Great_Britain).You could change the label to UNITED KINGDOM, because Ireland was part of the United Kingdom until 1922.

P.Raposo

Posted 14 January 2012 - 04:37 PM

Lovely work woneil - those seem as though they'll work well on e-reader screens. Nice treatment of pattern fills in the revisions. I agree with razornole about making the water the same on all three.

Perhaps a little simplification of borders, coastlines and rivers across the maps would help? The relatively coarse resolution e-readers sometimes have might really pixelate those if they're very sinuous, and I figure you don't need super-accurate river bend positions for this subject matter.

woneil

Posted 16 January 2012 - 05:48 PM

woneil

Will O'Neil

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Location:Falls Church, Virginia

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Many thanks again to all for these comments and recommendations, which have done much to help me make the maps better. In some cases I am not going to take action on what in other contexts would be very good suggestions simply because of the specific needs the maps are geared to. But I do appreciate them and have made note of them for future reference.